I had some fun with this one. This was my first attempt at cutting aluminum on the CNC. I wanted something a bit different for the pickup rings than the ones I found for sale online. And I didn’t see natural wood contrasting well with the dyed burl.

The hardware was designed in CorelDraw and imported into Vectric Cut2D to produce the g-code for both the aluminum and the abalone pieces. These were both cut on the CNC. The aluminum was then sanded to 1500 to give it a clean matte finish. I’m definitely very pleased with the result. It adds a bit of ‘bling’ to the guitar I think.

RaffleFor the fourth year in a row now, my company has supported/hosted a charity raffle I started to benefit Make-a-Wish Illinois. The top prize each year is a guitar I built and donated. I’m incredibly proud to report that this year we sold $7,000 in tickets and with the corporate match have donated $14,000 to Make-a-Wish. This brings our 4-year total to $32,000.

With the winner’s permission, I got a chance to play it on “Footloose” during the show right after the raffle…

And here’s the lucky winner trying out his new guitar on the House of Blues stage after the show: